When searching for marketing ideas for a small business online, you will undoubtedly come across information about mailing list campaigns and the importance of getting to know consumers. After all, why would anyone want to buy from you if they have never heard of your company before? Why would anyone feel compelled to order from your company if you give them no reason to trust you?

Here are some tips to consider before marketing your business;

o Marketing Ideas Small Business Tip 1: Email campaigns are considered to be a great marketing plan for a small company on the internet. It allows for you to connect with prospects. Just as long as they give you permission to contact them, then you will have better opportunities for success.

o Marketing Ideas Small Business Tip 2: As you get to know customers, you will have an advantage over competitors. You will have a good idea about what they want and how to provide them with what they want. When Marketing schemes for small company success will come to you more naturally as long as your email list subscribers are targeted and qualified. Keep in mind that you should not bombard them with email ad after email ad. You should never, ever send out junk mail. If you do that, you will defeat and undermine the best marketing schemes for small company success. They subscribe to your list because they want more information.

o Marketing Ideas Small Business Tip 3: You should not try to sell your subscribers anything when sending out emails. Instead, give them the information they seek and allow them to come to you. If you do a good job at providing them with unique content, they WILL come to you and buy from your company.

o Marketing Ideas Small Business Tip 4: Offer you subscribers special discounts for your products. People will always value you more for doing this.

While there are many other good marketing ideas for small business success, your main goal should be to create “and maintain” a good relationship with consumers through email. Having a list of qualified contacts is essential to the long term success of your business on the internet.

This leadership tip has something in it for managers everywhere, but it’s particularly targeted at those of you with large company backgrounds who have made career moves to smaller businesses that you own and/or manage.

My background is primarily in large scale management of IT organizations. The companies where I’ve worked were places where changing a process or behavior took some time. I always thought I was quicker than most, and action oriented. As a small business owner, I found I had to be much quicker.

I’ll offer this leadership tip in the form of a story. It’s a story of how taking your eye of the ball can cost you money, and worse than that can cost you customers.

My First Small Business

I opened a small personal services business. It was located about an hour from my home office, and with all my other commitments I knew how important hiring the right manager would be for this shop. It took a few tries, but I found one with a good background and references, and she seemed to quickly develop loyalty to the business and to me.

For the first six months we grew slowly but steadily. We were behind plan in terms of customers and revenue, but the trend was up. There were a few staff issues, but overall turnover was okay. I decided to invest a little more in marketing to try and get more new faces in the door.

Over the next three months, customer counts were mostly flat, and average sale was actually down a little. Concerned, I visited the shop a few times more than usual. The people were not as upbeat as they had been. When asked about that, they attributed their moods to less business and less enjoyment of the job. I wondered about seasonality, the economy, and whether I needed even more marketing investment.

Want to know what was really going on? My trusted manager had some personal problems that I had not been aware of before, and was exhibiting some totally unacceptable behaviors:

Criticizing staff in front of customers

Intimidating staff, letting them know they were at risk of being fired, and telling them I was out to get them.

Stealing money by voiding transactions and other means

The Damages

I’m still figuring out how much money all this cost me, but the money is only today’s problem. The customers I’ve lost are a more serious longer term issue, because many of them won’t be coming back.

When I figured out what was going on, I moved quickly to fire the manager. There were only two problems:

I was too late, and there had been several months of damage done;

There was collateral damage. I had to fire two other employees who had adopted the attitude and behaviors of the manager.

Today, I’m working on putting together data to see if I can assemble a case for prosecuting the employees and the manager. An even higher priority, though, is the work I’m doing to recruit and orient new staff and develop a recovery plan for our customer service reputation.
This leadership tip was a painful lesson that I hope never to repeat.

Today, business cards are still as one of the most powerful and effective marketing and advertising weapons, just like they have always been for decades. Although most companies use them primarily because of their low cost, business cards are able to offer a lot more benefits to companies and businesses of all kinds. If you are wondering how exactly using business cards can help your company, read on.

Business cards offer a convenient way to introduce your company to your target market or reach out to more people:

Whether you are just starting out in the market or are looking to reach out to a wider customer base, choosing to use business cards offer an easy and excellent way to both announce the launch of your company and introduce the kind of business you have to the public. Because they are small and portable, you can easily carry a hundred with you anywhere you go so that you can give them out to prospects. Some places where you can give out biz cards include business meetings or appointments, trade fairs and conventions. You can also leave a couple on the counter of your store or on the desks of your employees so that customers can easily get one for their future reference.

Business cards can be designed to have all the information you want your target audience to know:

Although they are small, business cards can pack a punch and can be printed to have tons of valuable information. As a matter of fact, you can even add some information about a special deal or offer that the receiver can take advantage of, which can make your marketing card design even more effective.

Business cards can be used to reinforce the other marketing tools and strategies you have in place:

As a company, it is important for you to make sure that you are able to utilize a wide range of tools and techniques so that you can create an overall marketing strategy which can effectively carry out your business goals; and the good thing about marketing cards is that they are versatile and flexible that they can be used for reinforcing whatever types of marketing tools you are already using.

These are just some of the ways on how biz cards can be useful for marketing your company and the type of business you have. Before using business cards, however, just like other types of marketing tools, you should make sure that you are able to come up with a design which can effectively represent your company and the products and services that you have for your target market.

When we think of home business, we can often get misconceptions that home based business is all about starting a home business of your own from scratch. The truth is that there are many home business opportunities that can help you easily get into a home based business of your own, and start making money.

Reading every word of this article will result in you discovering:

* The Benefits Of Starting A Home Based Business From Scratch
* The Benefits Of Starting In A Business Opportunity?
* Making Your Choice For Success

* The Benefits Of Starting A Home Based Business From Scratch

Though home business opportunities are easy to get started with, there are several benefits of starting with your own home based business ideas.

The biggest benefit is that your idea may benefit mankind or at least a portion of it. If your home based business ideas are ideas that people want in products or services, then it may be best to pursue the idea.

However, there is a warning. And that is that ideas are a dime a dozen – literally! Everyone has ideas, and you have to judge your idea with no bias. If you can do market research and find people want this product or service, then you may be onto a winner.

* The Benefits Of Starting In A Business Opportunity?

Start a home business with your own idea can take time. This time you need to invest initially in market research, then planning. This could take weeks, it could take months. The result is that some people can’t wait this long to get there first customers.

Home business opportunities allow you to cut out this time for planning and market research. In a home based business opportunity, you can easily join, and get started in days rather than weeks or months. Investment levels are generally small and potential is big.

Home business opportunities also give you all the information you need. They generally give you support and a system that works, when you work it.

* Making Your Choice For Success

Now is the time for action and success. There must come a point when you decide. And this decision is either going to be towards your own home based business ideas or a home business opportunity.

How you make your choice will come down to your needs. For some people a home business opportunity is no good because it doesn’t give them what they always wanted – a way to bring there creativity to the world, with there own product, service or invention.

For many the prospect of having potential to create a future nest egg, for themselves and their families, is a big must. So, in this case home business opportunities can be a great way to make that happen and faster. Remember home business opportunities still need research, however; generally the time saving is much better than with home based business ideas.